The International Olympic Committee and International Ski Federation may not have intended to boost the United States into the position of power player in the Winter Games, but that is what they have done with the inclusion of new sports.

First it was the addition of freestyle skiing — moguls and aerials — and snowboarding that helped Team USA's cause, along with a concerted effort by the U.S. Olympic Committee to improve Team USA's fortunes after a disastrous 1988 Olympics in Calgary when it managed a paltry six medals.

When the Olympics returned to Canada four years ago in Vancouver, the U.S. led the world in total medals (37) for the first Winter Games since 1932 in Lake Placid. And it wasn't close. Germany was second with 30.

Sochi will see the debut of additional sports that are good for the U.S., including ski halfpipe, ski and snowboard slopestyle and women's ski jumping. Thank you, IOC.

"From our standpoint, it just so happened that in those sports we had a lot of really great talent," said Alan Ashley, chief of sport performance for the USOC, and a former cross country skier for the University of Colorado. "It was an opportunity for us to get behind that talent and to give them a chance to become Olympians and be successful. While there was a strategic effort globally to add sports that were attractive, it really benefitted us."

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The 230-member U.S. Olympic team for Sochi includes 99 who competed in Vancouver. It boasts 49 Olympic medalists and 13 Olympic champions. It is strong not only in new sports invented in the USA, but in some old-school sports long dominated by European nations.

The U.S. has a strong alpine team led by Bode Miller, Ted Ligety and Eagle-Vail's Mikaela Shiffrin. It has a surging cross country team. The U.S. is strong in bobsled and speed skating, too, but it is in the so-called "emerging" sports where the U.S. can haul off a pile of medals. One of them is actually the oldest of old-school sports: ski jumping.

American Ryan Stassel competes in the men's slopestyle qualification round at the Olympics in Sochi on Thursday. (Cameron Spencer / Getty)

Women ski jumpers filed suit to force inclusion of their sport in the Vancouver Games. That suit failed, but 14 months after Vancouver the IOC announced women's ski jumping would be part of the Sochi Games.

One of the Team USA's women ski jumpers, Sarah Hendrickson, is the reigning world champion. She will be one of the most fascinating stories on Team USA because she's not only trying to become the first woman to win an Olympic gold medal in her sport, she'll be competing after rupturing an anterior cruciate ligament in August.

"Sarah's dealt with a difficult situation, and obviously that has created massive challenges for her in terms of preparation," said Luke Bodensteiner, the U.S. Ski Team's vice president for athletics. "She has dedicated herself completely to her rehab and return to sport. She did everything the medical team asked of her, and she's done everything our coaches have asked of her. Her performance on the hill has been good. Her knee has been unaffected by training, she feels good. I think she is well positioned to go to Sochi and have a very, very good performance.

"She is already one of the great stories of this team, in terms of resilience and dedication."

In ski halfpipe and slopestyle, the U.S. Team is dominated by perennial champions and up-and-comers who shined through the qualifying season. David Wise in the halfpipe and Nick Goepper in slopestyle roll into Sochi with a string of qualifying wins — including consecutive golds at the X Games — that make them appear untouchable. Goepper leads a dominant slopestyle team, which includes Denver's Bobby Brown and Telluride's Gus Kenworthy.

The team is so strong, Goepper isn't afraid to lay down the claim for a U.S. podium.

"I think the Americans are going to sweep the podium in Sochi," said the 19-year-old from Indiana. "We are going to dominate in slopestyle."

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